by Joshua Cook
“Nice job. Now the binding,” Xid whispered, careful not to break his concentration. Cendan wasn’t listening though; he was wholly bent to the task at hand. Finding the soft point in the Bridge pattern – the one that if he were to pull it out would cause the pattern to collapse – he would join it to the pattern in the stone. Once done, the stone would form a powered base for the marching flow of magic here, and the Bridge would last until the magic of this world went out; which Cendan very much hoped was very far into the future.
Moving the soft point was a dance he decided, a dance of exact measurement. Too hard and the pattern fell; too soft and it would never bind. Sweating as he worked the magic, Xid looked at him with new respect. Cendan had no clue just how powerful he was, but Xid knew. He was the most singularly gifted person born with the creator talent she’d ever met. What he was doing normally took years of practice and failure, and here he was, three or four days in, and making it work! Her mouth compressed into a line. He was still a Bridgefinder though, and the whole reason the world was in danger. The Elder’s plan would work, and the other Shrouded, who were foolish enough to want to help his kind, would believe it had been an accident. The Elves were powerful, and what could she do?
The soft point finally fell into place, and just like that, the Bridge was now permanent. A huge grin broke out on Cendan’s face. He was nearly done, almost there. Just to join the Bridge here with the Bridge in the Elven village, and he’d be finished. Saying it was easy, but doing it, well… He’d gotten this far. Normally he’d need something from the other side of the Bridge. Xid had told him that was because the magic needed a ‘memory’ to find the other end. That he didn’t have, but he had himself, which apparently was the next best thing. He’d gone through the Bridge there, and so, he should be able to find it and tie them together. Should being the operative word.
Through his unbound Bridge, Cendan reached out. He was physically still standing on that spit of sand, but his mind flew through the Bridge, trying to home into the Bridge in the Elven village. Thankfully, Xid had been right; it drew him like a beacon. He could see the threads of the Magic here, on the Echo World, tying things together. So odd, similar to the points of light on our world, but still, different enough. He paused, however, when he got a good mental ‘look’ at the Bridge.
He had forgotten. The Bridge here was banned to Elves. He was totally aware of it now, some film of woven magic overlaying this end of the connection. How did he get past that? He could, as a human, but if the Elves were to be believed, and in this case he was pretty sure they could be, it wouldn’t let them through. What could he do? Calm down, he berated himself. Falling back on old skills, he tried to approach this as a job from his old life. This was a system. It used different rules, but it was a system.
The Elves not getting through needed a work around. The workings of the Slyph had caused a… a bug. Think of it like a computer bug, Cendan, a bug he couldn’t un-program, but maybe he could bypass. From his end of the Bridge, he sent a small thread of magic through to the Elven side. Xid’s breath came sharp.
“What are you doing? That’s not part of the pattern!”
Cendan ignored her. He had to keep his concentration; he was juggling multiple patterns across two worlds and trying to explain what was going on was a stretch.
If the magic of the Echo world was laid out in threads, and the threads were woven into magic, which implied a ‘cloth’ of magic. Maybe, just maybe, he could force a whole through the woven threads, stretch out a large enough hole for the Elves to use the Bridge. Cendan had no idea if this would work. Truthfully, he was somewhat surprised he could even keep up with everything he was doing right now. Pushing aside all the distractions his mind was coming up with, he took a deep breath and pushed at the film with his thread of earth magic.
Nothing he had ever experienced in his life prepared him for the feeling that hit him the moment the probe like thread hit the Slyph’s barrier. Pain? Pleasure? Cold? Hot? He felt like his chest was about to burst from joy, and in the exact same moment his ears were going to explode from a noise that only he could hear. He could feel his concentration slipping, the patterns he was balancing flicker and begin to falter. A low groan escaped Cendan’s lips, and he cleared his mind, clearing up the flickering pattern. His probe had made it though. It was through! Now to stretch it out; the hole needed to be bigger. Much bigger.
Quickly working the pattern, he formed the thread into a tube and began to make it wider. The feelings were not nearly as intense though Cendan could very much do without ever feeling that again. Still, his teeth ground together at how massively uncomfortable he felt. Larger still, and the feelings started to fade more.
“Larger,” Cendan muttered, forgetting Xid was there at all. All his concentration was used at this point. Larger still the hole went, until finally, he felt certain it would work.
He didn’t know if the weaves of that world would return to shape, though, so he had to work fast to combine this tube of his to the Bridge; to keep the way open. It did not escape a corner of his mind that he was working all this, all this work for a race of magical creatures who only wanted to come here to steal horses and human women. He’d shake his head at the irony of it if he could have done.
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Xid watched his working with a confused look. What in the hell was Cendan doing? This tube he had formed that wasn’t part of the standard Bridge pattern. What was he up to?
She watched as he deftly added this new pattern to the Bridge pattern. His natural skill when he wasn’t over-thinking things had asserted itself, and this time the new pattern slid into place without any effort.
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Cendan for his part wasn’t even paying attention; he was tired, very tired, and starting to fade. Finally, everything was in place for the final binding. He forged a new connection, this time having to draw from the well of magic in his key; the making of the tunnel had exhausted the magic he had gathered at the beginning. ‘Just a little more’ he told himself, a few more moments.
He could see both ends approaching each other, and then with one final burst of concentration, the connection leapt between the two Bridges. The end points slid together as if they had always been that way. The patterns were stable, they held, and no longer needed Cendan’s help. With a feeling of triumph, he released it all and staggered off to the side. He had done it.
“Xid. Let’s... get out of here,” Cendan said, the note of exhaustion clear in his voice.
Xid stood, eyeing his work.
“Yes. I think that’s a good idea; I should get out of here.”
Cendan looked up and saw her face. He knew at that moment that she was going to leave him here.
“Xid! What…”
Ignoring him, Xid worked a pattern quickly, faster than he’d ever seen one go, a dance of light flowing out of her fetish. With a nod, Xid vanished, transported back to Rivenwood, leaving him here with an active Bridge to the Echo world; one that led to a group of elves that were going to be very unhappy with his solution to their bargain.
Cendan stood there, stunned. Why had Xid just ... well ... abandoned him? As he stood there, Rivenwood’s warning came back to him: ‘not all the Shrouded wanted to help the Bridgefinders’. Gardener Xid must have been one of those, and had simply been waiting, waiting for the right moment to get rid of him. He had to admit he hadn’t seen it coming. Xid had never been super-friendly, but she’d not been antagonistic either. His sight registered a slight fluctuation in the Bridge. He didn’t have time to sit around and figure out why Xid had left him here.
He had one chance. Just one. The copying pattern. There were two main issues. One: the pattern Xid had used was far more complex that his simple light pattern he’d tried it on before. And secondly, but far more importantly, he didn’t even know if it would work. Before he’d been copying a pattern than he had put in place. This would be copying a pattern that someone else had used, and that he hadn’t gotten a good look to b
egin with. With a shudder, the Bridge started to become active, and Cendan knew he had no time to waste.
He was still bone tired; the Bridge’s creation had taxed him. The added work needed had even partially drained his focus of its well. He only hoped the well held enough residual magic to make the copying pattern in the first place. Closing his eyes, Cendan worked to ignore the Bridge that was now nearly open. Reaching into his focus, he drew the remaining magic out of the reservoir, and created his new pattern in same general place that Xid had been. He silently said a prayer, praying that this would work.
His eyes snapped open at the sound of a footfall on sand. There, an elf stood, taut and alert, staring at Cendan with golden amber eyes. A hint of a smile crossed the Elf’s face until he looked around. Then, turning to Cendan, the once calm face was quickly filled with anger. Whirling towards the Bridge, the Elf yelled something that Cendan couldn’t hear or understand; though he must have been the subject because the Elf pointed at Cendan with a hand shaking in anger.
Cendan turned his attention to where he had tried to form the copying pattern. There! Some pattern had formed, and he could only hope it would take him back to the Rivenwood and the Shrouded. Obviously not a safe place either, but not everyone there was out to get him. He ran towards the copied pattern and threw himself towards it with one glance back to the Bridge. King Lachnin and three new Elves were through, and Lachnin was not overly happy to see him. An elf cocked an arrow his way, but Cendan never saw it loose.
Pain engulfed him, worse pain than the travel there. He would later compare the feeling to being on a beach with high winds and being near sandblasted apart. Everything hurt, and all he could do was huddle into a ball as he fell through his tunnel, his tunnel to somewhere. Solid ground greeted him with a heavy thud, and all he could do was groan.
“Cendan!” Heather’s voice came to him as the grass he was on tickled his face. He had made it.
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Heather ran towards Cendan as he lay on the grass. His clothing smoked, giving off a strange smell, and what she could see of his skin was raw and painful looking. Gardener Xid had taken one look as Cendan came through and ran towards the wood.
“Xid... left me there. Left me to the Elves.”
Heather nodded; not that Cendan could see it. She had known there were some vocal members of the Shrouded, backed by some Elders, who wanted nothing to do with trying to help the Bridgefinders. She’d personally been approached by some when the decision to warn the Bridgefinders had been made. She’d been tempted, but had followed Rivenwood’s lead.
At first her decision had been one based mostly on saving her own skin. If Grellnot managed to beat the Slyph, something she found to be likely, and then Grellnot defeated the Bridgefinders, then all that raw power would make him very powerful. So powerful that she doubted that the Shrouded could do anything to the thing to stop it. True, there had been some curiosity about the now nearly mythical Bridgefinders. The Shrouded only talked about them in a historical tense, and knowing they were still around, she had wanted to see what all the fuss was about.
She’d not been impressed until she’d entered their headquarters. It was a phenomenal work of magic and skill, one that even she, from a vastly different background, could appreciate. And then there was Cendan. She looked down on the man, on the edge of exhaustion and in pain. Cendan had complicated every damn thing she’d done in the short time she’d known him. Her feelings were confused, her mind was confused, and even her physical responses to the man were confused. She wasn’t about to leave him here though. Not at all.
She helped Cendan to his feet though he wasn’t totally able to walk right. For once he didn’t question her, or what they were doing. As fast as she could, she took him on a different path, toward Rivenwood’s tree and away from the direction Xid had gone. Xid was probably already in communion with whatever Elder had put her up to this. Now that they had been exposed, she wasn’t sure what else they were going to try, but they would have to do it soon.
“Damn, you are heavier than you look Bridgefinder,” Heather muttered. Pausing to lean against a rock, Heather reached through to her fetish to try to find something that would help them move faster. There was no such thing as a flight pattern, to the profound disappointment of generations of young Shrouded casters. Not even a fast travel pattern. But… there! A pattern used to make things easier to move.
Quickly working the pattern, drawing on the stored magic in her fetish, she worked it on the shoes Cendan was wearing. That should at least mean that the dragging would be easier as the pattern would keep his feet from digging into the ground. Heather wished she had time to talk to Rivenwood herself. As it was, she wasn’t going to stick around. She was going to take Cendan and get out of here. She didn’t know where they would end up, but being away from the rest of the Shrouded, at least while Cendan was under her care, was probably a good thing.
Chapter 19
Grellnot stood on rock, hearing the noises of the creatures he had gathered as they stood behind him. Grellnot cared nothing for them, and they were only there because of their fear. Grellnot could taste it in the air; they were reeking of it. The smell made him hungry, and happy. The foolish things were all going to die when the attack started. Grellnot was no fool, and he could count, for she had far more at her disposal. Even the things behind him – Goblins and Trolls, Jabbers and Xacin, Grublings and Montoes – they loved her just as much as the things that she had gathered.
Grellnot knew some would turn on him, regardless of how many Grellnot ate or threatened to eat. Stupid creatures were just a distraction; something to occupy her defenders so Grellnot could face off against her. The Slyph, one on one. Grellnot felt his hunger grow at the thought of her magic being his, savoring the raw feeling of it, becoming one with Grellnot. The tinkling sound of the Finders shinies on his neck still were comforting, but Grellnot wanted more. Did she even have bones to crunch and savor? Would there be a treasure to hang here on the necklace when he had eaten his fill of her flesh and magic?
Grellnot turned toward his assembled horde.
“Grellnot find you all! You serve Grellnot! Grellnot can smell your fear, your hate.” Grellnot spat onto the ground and grinned at the assembled things. The first line shrank back, the rank smell of terror wafting to Grellnot like flowers in a garden. “Grellnot not care. You serve! Or you die.”
A large Jabber moaned, its thousand mouths making a noise like a low rumble of thunder.
“Grellnot will lead you onward. The Slyph will die.”
Chatter broke out in a group of Grublings, pale worm like things with spider-like legs. Grellnot couldn’t understand Grublings, but it didn’t matter. Leaping from the rock, Grellnot landed in the midst of the pale things, grabbed the nearest one, and bit it in half. Chewing it slowly, Grellnot heard silence fall over the things he had gathered.
“You fight for Grellnot, or you die.” Throwing the body of the Grubling on the ground, he leapt forward, not letting the things behind him see the look of disgust on Grellnot’s face. Foul thing; not tasty; no blood. No rich blood, just a pale, pasty, gummy flesh thing.
“Follow!” Grellnot yelled as he heard the things slowly and quietly follow. Grellnot was marching to war.
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Exiting the Rivenwood was easier than Heather had hoped it would be. Greenguard let them past without a word, and the pattern she had used made the going a lot simpler. Cendan had regained some strength and was at least helping more as they made their way to his car.
“Why would Xid do that? I mean, I know Rivenwood said some didn’t agree, but to leave me there? I just… I don’t understand it,” Cendan asked out loud, still woozy from everything that had happened. He winced occasionally, his skin still red and painful in places. Heather didn’t say anything at first. She kept glancing behind them and making sure they weren’t being followed; at least physically. Once they were in the car, she planned on warding the hell out of it, but she didn’t wan
t to waste the time now.
“Heather, did you know she was like that?” Cendan asked, finally starting to come fully around. “And what the hell did you do to my feet?” he asked as he almost tripped and fell. “Feels like I’m walking on oiled ice.”
Heather sighed. “No of course I didn’t know Xid was one of those. You knew there were factions though, some people always have to try to have their way. Xid hid her feelings on the matter well. She must have just been looking for the chance to get rid of you.”
Cendan nodded as he stumbled again. “And the feet?”
Heather gave him an eye roll, “You couldn’t walk, and you were getting hard to drag around. I used a pattern that reduces friction so that I could actually move you until you could walk on your own.”
Cendan gave her an appraising look; that was a rather good idea he knew.
“Well can you undo it? Walking like this is hard. I don’t even want to try driving.”
Heather closed her eyes for a second, and suddenly the ground felt solid again to Cendan.
“Thanks,” Cendan said quickly.
They walked in silence, both glancing back.
“Why aren’t they after us?” Cendan muttered. Heather waved her hand in a see saw motion.
“I think, and it’s just a guess, that Xid’s move to leave you at the mercy of King Lachnin and the Elves was a plan of opportunity. When it failed, they really didn’t have a plan to fall back on. And of course, those who want to help you and yours were probably shocked at the attempt. Some may plot behind his back, but no one wants to go up against Rivenwood when he’s paying attention.” Heather looked behind them as well. “That being said, once we get in the car, I’m going to throw some magical protections up.”
The car. Cendan felt like he’d been stuck in a medieval fair for a week and was returning to the real world. The air temperature got warmer as they walked, just as it had gotten cooler closer in. They turned the corner into sunlight, blue skies, hot summer air, and his car.